Thursday, December 11, 2008

Royals - Sign Farnsworth, Ramirez, Waechter

Kansas City Royals - Signed P Kyle Farnsworth to a 2-year, $9.5 million contract; signed P Horacio Ramirez to a 1-year, $1.8 million contract; signed P Doug Wachter

RANDOM SELECTIONS FROM EXHAUSTIVE LIST OF BETTER IDEAS THAN SIGNING FARNSWORTH AND RAMIREZ

Update

Heh, from Royals Review:

I want the stats, the analysis and the theory; I don’t want the lame attempts at comedy. Those who write at these sites do the first three well and the fourth exceedingly poorly. Dan may think he’s trying out for The Daily Show’s sports report, but he isn’t. He’s a one trick monkey. Dance monkey!

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The thing that really kills you with Farnsworth, as any Cub or Yankee fan can tell you, is knowing that, if he comes into the game with two runners on base, even if there are two outs, it is a mortal lock that one of those two dudes is gonna score.

Rarely does a reliever signing win my "dumbest signing of the offseason" but this will be hard to beat.

(Note, "dumbest" is not necessarily "worst" -- in fact it usually takes a Zito-type signing to pull off the double. "Dumbest" is usually some combination of:

this guy is obviously not very good
he's not young
he doesn't have potential
he doesn't have a good track record
he doesn't have a good clubhouse rep
he's not a fan favorite
who would offer him that many years much less that much money ... who were you bidding against?

This one ticks all those boxes with the added bonus that producing decent/good cheap relievers is about the only thing the Royals have been any good at the last few years.

Y'know, that whole "we can pay Manny $30 M or build 50 ballfields" thing was silly but, as Dan rightly points out, "we could pay Farnsworth 2/$10 M or we could donate it to the Blagojevich defense fund" is a tough choice.

The thing that really kills you with Farnsworth, as any Cub or Yankee fan can tell you, is knowing that, if he comes into the game with two runners on base, even if there are two outs, it is a mortal lock that one of those two dudes is gonna score.

Sure, but he finds a way to surprise you still. For example, is he going to walk a guy then give up a HR? Is he going to give up a HR first? Is it merely going to be a double off the wall? Or is he just going to walk a couple straight batters? You can't put a price on that entertainment.

Baseball Stars for the SNES. The player is choosing to play as the SNK Crushers (the worst team in the game by a lot) to play against the computer, who is the American Dreams (the best team in the game). The Dreams have Koufax, Ruth, Mays, Bench, Gehrig, etc. The Crushers are made up of the game's programmers.

I'd rather have two years of Farnsworth at $9.5m than two of Nick Punto at $8.5m. At least with Farnworth, there's a possibility he could reel off 8 or 10 decent appearances right before the deadline and you could unload him.

Nick Punto, two years, $8.5 million? That's your dumbest deal of the offseason right there.

The thing that really kills you with Farnsworth, as any Cub or Yankee fan can tell you, is knowing that, if he comes into the game with two runners on base, even if there are two outs, it is a mortal lock that one of those two dudes is gonna score.

Well, I meant not (yet!) a fan favorite in KC. If the Tigers had re-signed him after all the love he engendered there, this would be much more understandable. :-)

Nick Punto, two years, $8.5 million? That's your dumbest deal of the offseason right there.

Yeah, well, I probably don't quite agree with you but I made my claim about Farnsworth before I'd even seen the Punto deal so I'm probably just trying to save myself from looking stupid. I'll go with "pint-sized Twins fans love that scrappy little feller" as justification (whether that's true or not).

The duo of signings might well be the dumbest day in baseball since the Zito contract. Oh I'm going to regret saying that.

Signing Danys Baez to a 3 year $22M deal was pretty dumb, but you know, it was done by the Orioles.

Yeah, well, I probably don't quite agree with you but I made my claim about Farnsworth before I'd even seen the Punto deal so I'm probably just trying to save myself from looking stupid. I'll go with "pint-sized Twins fans love that scrappy little feller" as justification (whether that's true or not).

I want the stats, the analysis and the theory; I don’t want the lame attempts at comedy. Those who write at these sites do the first three well and the fourth exceedingly poorly. Dan may think he’s trying out for The Daily Show’s sports report, but he isn’t. He’s a one trick monkey. Dance monkey!

Well, of course YOU do -- but you're a pencil-necked, pocket-protector-wearing geek who's never been out of his mom's basement. I'm sure the pint-sized tykes must love him. He's cute and cuddly, right? He's a shining example of a player who plays the game the right way, right? He saves a run a game with his glove, right? He's what every god-fearing, true American little boy should want to be when he grows up, right? You see many 8-year-olds roaming the Metrodome with Brendan Harris jerseys? Surely it's fair to say that Nick Punto is the opposite of Barry Bonds in almost every way imaginable. So what are you, some sort of Bonds lover?

The guy has been a great columnist and a great guy for years. Yeah, hes written some silly stuff in his later days... but how on earth does that get him associated with fetish porn. Wtf? It makes no sense, and isn't funny at all. Plus, if any columnist is going to be unfairly lumped in with "fetish porn" Bisher isn't even close to being the most deserving of that crap.

I actually have played a hand where the board showed a royal flush. I guess I'm a seriously bad man.

Sir, I actually played a hand where the board showed four of a kind with an Ace kicker. There were four of us left. One guy threw in his hand disgustedly and said, "I can't beat that". We quietly split the pot. Three ways. About a month later some wag broke it to him, and not gently.

How the hell were four of you still in with that kind of board? The only possible way I can see it is if it came (X is whatever ended up being 4 of a kind) XXA flop, and whomever raised/called preflop had done so with pocket pairs and aces, and whichever one bet out made a small stab at it. Everyone calls, checks all around on the turn (which has to come X), though the last guy can't have an A, he has to be a PP person, because there's no way he can check if everyone just called on the flop and then checked to him on the turn and he has an ace. He's got X full of Aces, and that's basically a lock to be the nuts.

or everyone could have limped-in/checked, and then they checked it down with everyone fearing the others were slowplaying. Then after the river, I assume the first person would bet big and hope some numbnuts folds before they realize what is going on.

Jacobs, who turned 28 years old on Thursday, belted a career-high 32 homers and drove in 93 runs with a .247 batting average in 2008. He is a career .262 hitter with 80 homers and 247 RBI in 421 big league games with Florida and the New York Mets.

"We're delighted to acquire a productive hitter to impact the middle of our lineup," said Royals general manager Dayton Moore. "Mike's a winner and has a very aggressive approach to baseball and we look forward to his presence on our club."